VietNamNet Bridge - On Monday, January 6, the authorities excavated over 70 sets of remains, founded by “telepath” Nguyen Thanh Thuy, at the martyrs’ cemetery in the Central Highlands province of Dak Lak, for DNA tests to identify whether they are the remains of martyrs or not.

Telepath Thuy (first from left) during an excavation of martyr's remains in Dak Lak.

In late 2012 and early 2013, Thuy joined two trips, held by the Vietnam Bank for Social Policy, to Ea H'leo commune, Dak Lak, to search for remains of martyrs. He founded 73 sets of remains of martyrs. Seventy sets of remains were buried in the martyrs’ cemetery in Dak Lak.

Thuy was later arrested by Quang Tri province’s police agency to investigate the acts of counterfeiting remains of martyrs.

Dak Lak province authorities also established a committee to investigate the case and the committee decided to excavate 70 sets of remains for DNA tests.

In Dak Lak, Thuy also found two more sets of remains for two martyrs’ families in Buon Ma Thuot and was paid VND250 million ($17,000).

Thuy, 54, a native of northern province of Bac Ninh, and his wife, Man Thi Duyen, were arrested on October 28, 2013, for investigation of faking war martyr remains, earning hundreds of thousands of USD from the Bank for Social Policies of Vietnam.

Thuy and Duyen were arrested after the national television broadcaster VTV aired a report that was prepared over two years, reporting that the bank cooperated with Thuy to excavate fake remains of war martyrs to appropriate tens of billion dong from the budget during December 2007 – July 2013 period.

According to VTV’s investigation, 105 graves in the cemetery of martyrs of three provinces contained animal bones. Thuy and the VBSP illegally conducted four excavations with the support of local governments.

Each set of "remains," according to VTV, the bank paid Thuy VND75 million (over $3,500) and a total of VND300 million ($15,000) for each remain searching case. In only four excavations, Thuy was paid VND7.9 billion (nearly $400,000), not to mention dozens of other excavations.

Thuy was a former police officer but he was fired and jailed for abuse of power and committing fraud. In 2005, after his release from prison, Thuy called himself a telepath and began offering war martyr remain searching service.

In 2007, Thuy began cooperating with the Vietnam Bank for Social Policies to search for the remains of war martyrs in several provinces. The search missions have left many questions.

On July 27, 2013, Thuy and the bank “found” the remains of nine war martyrs in the central province of Quang Tri. However, the case was defined as fraud since the remains, including animal bones, had been buried just before the search. In many other cases, there were many proofs showing Thuy’s frauds.

Through the search of over 100 sets of remains, Thuy and his wife earned tens of billions of dong from the families of martyrs and the Vietnam Bank for Social Policies.

Thuy and Duyen were transferred from Bac Ninh to Quang Tri province for investigation.

At a press conference of the Government on October 26, Head of the Government Office – Mr. Vu Duc Dam said that this is a serious case that must be investigated and informed to the public.

Trung Duong